


Bees Have To Fly Around The Globe Three Times To Make A Pound Of Honey

by Himrqwerty



Category: 9-1-1 (TV)
Genre: Angst, Christopher Diaz is a National Treasure, Eddie Diaz realizes he's been an asshole, Evan "Buck" Buckley Needs A Hug, Gen, M/M, The 118 being assholes, Worried Eddie Diaz, research spiral
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-11
Updated: 2020-07-11
Packaged: 2021-03-04 18:27:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,408
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25200880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Himrqwerty/pseuds/Himrqwerty
Summary: There was something about a video game, then several facts about bees, and then Buck excitedly shouted “They have five eyes, Chris!”“Five?” Chris responds, just as excited. “Why - why do they need five?”~In which Eddie realizes that Christopher is a better listener than anyone at the 118.
Relationships: Evan "Buck" Buckley & Christopher Diaz & Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV), Evan "Buck" Buckley & Christopher Diaz (9-1-1 TV), Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV), Evan “Buck” Buckley & Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV)
Comments: 44
Kudos: 579
Collections: 9-1-1 Tales





	Bees Have To Fly Around The Globe Three Times To Make A Pound Of Honey

Buck bursts through the front door, quickly tugging off his shoes and haphazardly tossing his jacket towards his usual coat hook. Christopher, who had been excitedly waiting for his arrival, was nearby. The two collided, hugging each other tightly. Buck was already talking, but Eddie didn’t understand a thing he was saying.

There was something about a video game, then several facts about bees, and then Buck excitedly shouted “They have five eyes, Chris!”

“Five?” Chris responds, just as excited. “Why - why do they need five?”

“It’s so they can see light better! See, they have two big eyes that see shapes and three little eyes on the very top of their head,” he pauses, tapping the top of Chris’s head to illustrate, “that can’t see shapes! It’s to detect if a predator is coming at them from above. Isn’t that cool!”

Buck is so hyped up that he’s basically vibrating, and Eddie can see that Chris is right along with him.

They still haven’t moved from the front entrance — Buck is crouched down to be eye level with Chris. 

“And, even weirder is they have  _ hair _ ,”

“C’mon, you kids. Chris has to do his science homework and then we have to eat dinner.”

As Eddie ushers Chris to the dining room, where his science homework sits abandoned, he sees Buck deflate. The excited look on his face drops. In the glimpse Eddie gets, he looks disappointed, angry with himself. “Right, sorry,” he mutters. Eddie looks over at him while he gets Chris re-settled at the table. It’s like he can see Buck building himself back up again: breathing in deeply, squaring his broad shoulders, smoothing his eyebrows, placing a casual smile on his face, unclenching his white knuckles, and then looking up to meet Eddie’s concerned gaze.

Buck raises an eyebrow, smiling more broadly before finally leaving the entryway of Eddie’s house and walking to the kitchen to grab a beer.

Eddie is still watching him carefully, unsure of what exactly just went on in Buck’s mind.

For a man that talks so much with such an expressive face who seems so open, Buck’s inner thought processes are often a mystery. Eddie has spent the last two years trying to figure them out. He had thought he’d figured Buck out, but he hadn’t seen the lawsuit coming, and it had completely blindsided him. Even all these months after Buck dropped it, Eddie still hasn’t returned to even close the same level of confidence. If nothing else, the lawsuit had shown him that Buck is deeper and more complicated than he ever previously thought.

Eddie looks on as Buck opens his beer, clutching tightly at it. He drinks the first half fast, gulping down large mouthfuls, Adams apple bobbing harshly.

Eddie turns his attention back to his kid. Chris has been quietly working on his science homework, which Eddie sees is about flowers and pollination.  _ Oh. _ He looks from the paper in front of Chris back to Buck, who has gone from drinking beer too fast to picking at the label of an almost-empty beer.

By the time Eddie is capable of stringing together a full sentence, Chris is done with his homework and has joined Buck in the kitchen. He’s gently knocking Buck with a crutch, insisting that he cooks spaghetti for dinner. Buck is beaming down at the kid, nodding along seriously with Chris’s story.

“Cause, Buck, my - my friend Mercury got to have lef - leftover spag-ghetti and so I’ve been wanting it all - all day. You - you gotta make it!”

Buck’s smile drops into a serious face, the edges of his mouth still twitching upwards, fighting back a smile.

“I don’t know, Chris… Do I also have to make enough so you have leftovers?”

Chris nods.

“Hmm… I don’t know…”

Chris knocks Buck with a crutch. “Bucky!” he cries.

Buck’s faux-serious face explodes back into a smile. “Oh, alright. You’ve convinced me.” Chris laughs, leaning against Buck, who places a hand on Chris’s back. It’s partially a hug and partially to keep Chris stable while he giggles.

The sight makes Eddie soft. Buck has always been so good with Chris, loved him so purely. 

Eddie shakes himself out of his thoughts and joins Buck in asking Chris questions about school.

The dinner making process goes smoothly. Buck boils the pasta and heats up some of the red sauce that Cap gave Eddie this week. Eddie chops a basic salad, and less than a half-hour later the three of them are sitting at the dinner table, tucking into their food.

After Buck has made a decent dent in his spaghetti, Eddie asks, “So, Buck, you mentioned something about bees having hair?”

Buck instantly chokes, inhaling a piece of spaghetti. He coughs and sputters for a second, weakly responding, “what?”

Eddie waits. After a few more seconds, he prompts Buck again. “Bee hair?”

Buck blinks at Eddie in confusion for another second or two before turning to Chris and continuing right where he left off. “Yeah, Chris, bees have  _ hair _ on their  _ eyes _ ! Can you imagine? Getting an eyelash in your eye is practically the worst feeling on earth and they live with it every day!”

Chris giggles at that, rubbing at his eye to get rid of an imaginary lash. In the process, he smears red sauce all over his face. Buck laughs with him, reaching over to dab away the sauce with his napkin.

“And, Chris, each worker bee only produces about one-twelfth of a teaspoon of honey in their whole life!! The average American eats a pound of honey in a year, so we consume the hard work of over one-thousand bees each year!” Buck is gesticulating wildly and Chris’s eyes are wide, completely enraptured with Buck.

Buck’s eyes flick over to Eddie before returning to Chris. “They have to get nectar from two million flowers to make our pound of honey, too!”

Buck is slowing down. His eyes return to Eddie more often, his hands remain closer to his chest. “But, you know, you need to eat up so you can be as strong as a worker bee. C’mon, Superman, start eating again.” At Buck’s insistence, Chris tucks back into his meal, delighting in getting sauce all over his face while he slurps pasta.

The table is mostly quiet while the three finish their meal. Chris occasionally interjects with another school story that comes to mind, but for another twenty or so minutes, the loudest suns are chewing and slurping.

After dinner, Buck settles Chris in front of the tv to get started on setting up a new video game that Buck brought over. Video games have never been Eddie’s strong suit, but Buck loves them, and so has been getting games that are easier for Chris to play. This one is called “Lovers in Dangerous Space.” Buck had sent Eddie a link so he could approve it before Buck brought it over and Eddie was impressed. It’s the perfect blend of not-designed-for-disabled-kids and simple-enough-for-Chris-to-play.

Once the game is set up and Chris is browsing options, Buck joins Eddie in the kitchen to wash up. He dries while Eddie washes, his sleeves rolled up to his elbow.

“Hey, man, I gotta ask.” Buck tenses ever so slightly. If Eddie hadn’t been looking, if he wasn’t trying to relearn Buck with all of this new context, he wouldn’t have noticed. “Why do you only share those facts with Chris?” It isn’t like he hasn’t noticed. Buck’s research spirals have shown up in every area of their life. He had over-Googled shattered leg recovery, possible effects of Bobby’s exposure to radiation, and countless other things. Once, when he and Buck had been in the sewer to rescue someone, Buck had casually mentioned Clostridioides difficile, a bacteria present in poop that can cause all sorts of disgusting symptoms. Eddie had shouted at Buck to  _ please, God, read the room about when to mention disgusting facts _ . Buck had quipped something back about it being a sewer, not a room, and left it at that.

Buck shrugs. “He likes ‘em.”

Eddie raises his eyebrow. “There is no way Hen wouldn’t be fascinated by the number of bees it takes the create the honey that we consume in a year.” Buck snorts and nods in concession. He puts a few dishes away, obviously thinking.

“Well, he.” Buck pauses, deliberating. “He listens.”

And doesn’t that damn near break Eddie’s heart.

**Author's Note:**

> Research links!  
> https://www.lenstore.co.uk/eyecare/bee-eyes  
> https://matteroftrust.org/20-amazing-honey-bee-facts/  
> https://honeybeenet.gsfc.nasa.gov/Honeybees/Basics.htm  
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clostridioides_difficile_(bacteria)#Signs_and_symptoms
> 
> Inspired by this post: https://www.tumblr.com/likes/blog/yerwizardharry/615569487512616960


End file.
